Amazon is buying Eero, a company well-known for its routers and mesh Wi-Fi systems ideal for smart home setups.
Amazon said it will acquire Eero and its technology because it is "incredibly impressed with the Eero team and how quickly they invented a Wi-Fi solution that makes connected devices just work". Eero’s home routers are part of a mesh Wi-Fi system that can be set up in minutes.
Eero routers are relatively affordable and can extend reliable Wi-Fi throughout a home. If we had to guess, Amazon's acquisition of Eero could make Alexa-compatible gadgets easier to set up and maintain a quality internet connection. Although it didn't disclose a purchase price, Amazon has already admitted it is acquiring Eero to "help customers better connect smart home devices".
It seems like the Eero brand will remain following the acquisition, but that isn't confirmed. When Amazon acquired Ring, it kept the brand alive and still sells and makes new products. Eero, in its statement to the media, merely it is excited to learn from Amazon and "work closely with a team that is defining the future of the home". It did, however, suggest Amazon plans to "bring Eero systems to more customers around the globe".
Eero's mesh Wi-Fi systems are perfect for smart homes with many internet-connected devices, including but not limited to Amazon Echo devices. With multiple of these in your home, Wi-Fi can become hard to use, especially in far corners of the house. This acquisition makes total sense for Amazon, as it continues to be a dominate force in the connected gadget space.
It'll be interesting to see what happens. Let's not forget that Google, too, is in the mesh Wi-Fi space, thanks to its existing Google Wifi routers. So this will be yet another category the two companies compete in going forward.